Glorious or Trashy, the -Ism with Attitude ; as the V&A Hosts a Show, Corinne Julius Looks at the Origins of Postmodernism

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[broken bar] RCHITECTURAL and design theory might seem a long way from most Londoners' lives, but what architects and designers argue about has a habit of coming to influence the nature of the city, its buildings and what's inside them. Postmodernism, which developed in the Seventies and flourished in the Eighties and early Nineties, has been one of the most reviled architectural movements, yet a highly influential one.

Ideas propounded by postmodernists and exploited (often very badly) by others have been absorbed across the built environment. Docklands developments are full of red and blue painted metalwork; classier projects such as No 1 Poultry by Sir James …